"England and America are two countries separated by a common language." - George Bernard Shaw

Saturday, October 08, 2005

Visa, bad teeth, Tijuana, TV and too many damn donuts

For you American expats in the UK, I found a forum with lots of good info. UK-Yankee Forum.
The best part about finding the Web site was finding this post Garry posted in February.
"For people concerned about their fiancé or spousal visas, it's interesting to take note of last year's statistics.
On the North American desk, which includes the 3 US consulates and the consulate on Canada, there were a total of 42 refusals for settlement out of 4,771 applications.
It means the odds of success are 99.2% in your favour. The best odds in the whole world!
Chicago has the highest percentage of refusals (1%), followed by NYC, and Ottawa. There were a paltry 2 refusals in LA for the whole year.
On the downside, the North American desk has a solid track record for upholding appeals - among the highest. It means that they do not issue refusals very often, but when they do, it tends to stick.
The British Consulate in Accra gets the hard-nosed award with a staggering 53% refusal rate for settlement applications."
Those odds make me happy. I have been having nervous attacks that they will reject my application. Ophelia asked me if they are going to ask me what kind of toothpaste Stuart uses, like that scene in Green Card where they ask Gérard Depardieu the brand of face cream Andie MacDowell uses.
I have no flippen clue what brand of toothpaste Stuart uses. He brushes them and they are very nice teeth for which I am grateful.
May I ask what is it with teeth in the UK? I am often terrible with mine. . . I don't floss and will let years go between visits but if I feel any pain I am right in there. I had braces as a kid and my bottom teeth have shifted on my slightly and I will probably do the clear braces thing soon.
But when I was in London it shocked me how often you would often see a very attractive person and then they opened their mouth and they looked like Sloth from The Goonies.
This is of course an exaggeration. But there were enough bad teeth that you notice it. Are kids just not tortured with braces?
Stuart and Ollie arrive tomorrow so I have been cleaning my apartment because it is rather dusty and I haven't mopped in months. I used to have a cleaning service come in and it was great because it forced me to keep my apartment clean. I would always have to clean before the maid came because I couldn't let them see the squalor that I would allow myself to live in if given half a chance.
Trying to think of fun cheap things to do with them. It might be nice to drive to San Diego so Stuart can meet my Nana but given how close Tijuana is, I am reluctant to do that. Nothing good could come from Stuart and Ollie being in Tijuana at the same time. I am certain a Mexican jail would be in our future.
I finally watched the last three episodes of the first season of Lost. Flippen love that show. What sucks now is I thought I had been DVRing the 2nd season but something went wrong so I need to borrow it from someone before I read or see something that I shouldn't.
Do they broadcast Gilmore girls over there? I may need to set up a black market for my TV shows.
We ordered the Krispy Kremes today for the wedding. 19 dozen. I figured approximately 75 people give or take. . .so 75 * 3 = 19 dz.
That's a hell of a lot of donuts.

3 Comments:

A lot of kids have braces to straighten teeth in the UK (been there, done that), but we don't tend to go for the whole tooth bleaching thing. Filling your mouth with noxious chemicals doesn't mean that you have healthier teeth - just that they are whiter.